Behind the Scenes: What A Career & Transition Coaching Practice Actually Looks Like
There are nine people I’m going to think about today
Seven work in regulatory, quality, communications, and IT roles, spread across pharma and medtech, finance, food, and SaaS. Two are in academic research.
Five women, four men, originally from seven different countries. Three in their early 30s, six in their late 50s.
I'm careful about what I share about clients. Coaching is confidential, and that matters a great deal to me. But every so often it's worth pulling back the curtain a little, because people considering coaching often have a vague picture of it that doesn't quite match reality.
The one thing they have in common
On paper, this group has very little in common: different companies, different specialties, different points in their careers.
One is stepping into their first leadership role. Another is looking to step down from leadership, back into something more hands-on. One has spent fifteen years in a role and is looking to bounce back after redundancy, being very intentional about what the next fifteen look like. Another is trying to work out whether being an employee is still the right fit, or whether it’s time to go independent, particularly after relocating.
But underneath, they all share one thing. They're each moving through a transition. Something is changing.
Not always dramatic. Not always a crisis. Sometimes it's an overwhelm from a new role, sometimes it's a boredom they can't quite name, sometimes it's the quiet realization that they've outgrown a role they used to love.
That's where coaching tends to be most useful. Not when something has gone wrong, but when something is changing and the normal support structures around you; your family, your friends, your boss, your team, your peers, … are either too close to the situation or not quite the right fit for the thinking you actually need to do.
What individual coaching looks like in practice
Something I'm conscious of when I describe what I do: it's quite narrow.
I don't run webinars. I don't facilitate workshops. I only coach 1:1, individually. And it's a deliberate choice.
One-to-one coaching is a particular kind of work. It's a space built entirely around one person, their situation, their thinking, their goals.
Because I believe everyone's story is unique.
Because I believe everyone has the answers within them.
Because I believe in the power of the coaching conversation.
The questions that create a pause. The moment when something a person has been circling for weeks finally gets named. The shift in someone's voice and energy when clarity arrives.
That's exactly what I want to be genuinely good at. Being a useful thinking partner to professionals and academics navigating transitions, using both their logic and intuition, in a conversation of two.
Most of this work happens online.
Why I'm sharing this
I don't usually talk about the day-to-day of my practice. But every now and then it feels worth saying, plainly, that this is a real thing, and real professionals and academics find it genuinely useful. The people I work with aren't in coaching because something has broken. They're in it because they're serious about where they're going, and they want to think carefully about how they get there.
If you're navigating a transition of any kind or just wondering about "what's next", the simplest way to find out if coaching might be useful for you, is a conversation.
My details are on this site.
